very well, that as the Roman language had not a variety of dialects, like the Greek, it would be in vain to think of giving his Bucolicks an air of rusticity, like those of Theocritus. Nor would it have been natural, if he could have succeeded in the attempt. The manners of his age and country were different; the Roman swains talked in as pure Latin in their fields, as Cicero could speak in the senate. He therefore wisely gave a different air to his Bucolicks, making his shepherds express themselves with that softness and elegancer, which gained him the esteem and admiration of the contemporary poets and critics, and recommended him to the protection and favour of the greatest men of his time. Virgil, without doubt, intended to imitate Theocritus, as appears by his frequent addresses to the muses of Sicily; but then he judiciously chose to imitate the most beautiful passages, and to pass by those which were too coarse, or not well enough adapted to the time in which he lived. Hence the Bucolicks of Virgil are called Eclogues, or select poems; because they are not a general

Horat. lib. i. sat. 10.
Ecl. iv. ver. 1.

• Sicelides Musæ, paulo majora canamus. Prima Syracosio dignata est ludere versu Nostra, nec erubuit sylvas habitare, Thalia.

Ecl. vi. ver. 1, 2.

Extremum hunc, Arethusa, mihi concede laborem.

с

Ecl. x. ver. 1.

collection of all the various subjects of pastoral poetry, or an imitation of the whole thirty Idyllia of Theocritus; but only a few chosen pieces, in which that poet's manner of writing is in some measure imitated, but at the same time very much improved. The simplicity, the innocence, and the piety, which many of our critics think essential to a pastoral, are far more conspicuous in the Bucolicks of Virgil, than in the Idyllia of Theocritus. The lover, in the twenty-third Idyllium, hangs himself; whereas Corydon, in the second Eclogue, sees the folly of his unruly passion, and repents. The shepherds, indeed, in the third Eclogue, rail sharply at each other; and Damœtas goes so far as to hint at some obscene action of his adversary: but the travellers, in the fifth Idyllium, speak out plainly, in terms not fit to be repeated. We are not entertained by Virgil with any particular hymn in honour of gods and heroes. He looked upon that as the province of the lyric poet, which we are told' he left entirely to his friend Horace. But there is an air of piety and religion, that runs through all the Eclogues, and indeed through all the writings, of our excellent poet.

As for the particular beauties of these Bucolicks, the reader will find most of them pointed out in the following notes: but there is one general beauty, which must not be passed by

without observation. In almost every Eclogue, we are entertained with a rural scene, a sort of fine landscape, painted by a most masterly hand. In the Tityrus, a shepherd is lying at ease, under the shade of a spreading beech, playing on his rural pipe; whilst another represents the different situation of his unhappy circumstances. We have the prospect before us of a country, partly rocky and partly marshy, a river and sacred springs, bees humming about the willows, and pigeons and turtles cooing on the lofty elms: and at last with the description of the evening, the lengthening of the shadows, and the smoking of the cottage chimneys. In the Alexis, a mournful shepherd laments his unhappy passion in a thick wood of beech-trees: we are presented with a most beautiful collection of flowers; and we see the tired oxen bringing back the plough after their work is over, and the setting sun doubles the length of the shadows. The country is in its full beauty, in the Palæmon; the grass is soft, the fruit-trees are in blossom, and the woods are green. The carving of the two cups is excellent, and far exceeds that in the first Idyllium of Theocritus. In the Pollio, we have a view of the golden age descending a second time from heaven; the earth pouring forth flowers and fruits of its own accord; grapes hanging upon thorns; honey dropping from oaks; and sheep naturally clothed with scarlet wool. In the Daphnis, two shepherds meet under the shade of

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elms intermixed with hazels, and retire for better shade into a cave covered by a wild vine, where they sing alternately the death and deification of Daphnis. Silenus, in the sixth, is found by two young shepherds asleep in a cave, intoxicated with wine, his garland fallen from his head, and his battered pitcher hanging down. A nymph assists them in binding him with his own garland, stains his face with mulberries, and compels him to sing upon which the fauns and wild beasts immediately dance to his measure, and the oaks bend their stubborn heads. In the Melibus, two herdmen have driven their flocks together, one of sheep and the other of goats, on the reedy banks of the Menzo, where a swarm of bees is buzzing in a hollow oak. In the Pharmaceutria, the heifers leave their food, to attend to the songs of Damon and Alphesibous; the ounces stand astonished, and the very rivers slacken their course. In the ninth, Moeris is carrying two kids on the road to Mantua, when he meets with his friend Lycidas, and falls into discourse with him. Virgil's farm is described; reaching from the declivity of the hills down to the river, with an old broken beech-tree for the land-mark. They go on singing, till the middle of their journey is distinguished, by the prospect of the sepulchre of Bianor, and the lake of Mantua. In the last Eclogue, the poet paints his friend Gallus in the character of a shepherd, surrounded by his sheep. The several sorts of herdmen come to visit him;

nor is he unattended by Apollo, the god of verse, or by Sylvanus and Pan, the deities of the country. The scene is laid in Arcadia, the fountain of pastoral poetry, where the poet gives us a prospect of the pines of Mænalus, the rocks of Lycæus, and the lawns of Parthenius. In the conclusion of the work, Virgil represents himself under the character of a goatherd, weaving slight twigs into baskets, under the shade of a juniper. This variety of images has been seldom considered by those who have attempted to write pastorals; and having now seen this excellence of Virgil, we may venture to affirm, that there is something more required in a good pastoral, than the affectation of using coarse, rude, or obsolete expressions; or a mere nothingness, without either thought or design, under a false notion of rural simplicity.

It is not a little surprising, that many of our modern poets and critics should be of opinion, that the rusticity of Theocritus is to be imitated, rather than the rural delicacy of Virgil. If the originals of things are always the most valuable, we ought to perform our tragedies in a cart, and the actors' faces ought to be stained with lees of wines: we should reject the use of corn, and feed upon acorns, like the ancient Arcadians.

I would not be thought, by what has been here said, to endeavour to depreciate the merit of

See the note on ver. 383. of the first Georgick.